In the Army, a Suggestion Is a Command Decision

We who have served in the nation’s armed forces never tire of the enjoyment we find in nostalgia for that period of servitude.

War is bestial; it is slaughter. Though it may produce individual acts of nobility, it is not noble in concept, as most good generals will agree. William Tecumseh Sherman is quoted as saying, “War is hell!”

Sherman’s words lose no force when we are told (in “They Never Said It” by Paul E. Boller Jr. and John George) that what the general actually said (at a convention of the Grand Army of the Republic in 1880) was, “There is many a boy here today who looks on war as all glory, but, boys, it is all hell!”

Most of us were enlisted men, or “boys,” as the general called them; and the humor we most enjoy evokes the relationship between officers and men. As decent as many officers were--perhaps most--they were of a different class, almost a different species, and their superiority was a burden that humor did much to relieve.

Who can forget the painful humor of Bill Mauldin’s wartime cartoons? One that particularly revealed the sometimes benign attitude of officers toward men showed two officers standing beside a Jeep on an Italian mountain road, looking out over the beautiful landscape below. “What a beautiful view,” says one to the other. “Is there one for the enlisted men?”

Kenneth Knight of Laguna Niguel sends me a memorandum issued by the major general commanding headquarters, Army Air Forces, Southeast Training Center, at Maxwell Field, Ala. The date is 14 August 1943.

The memorandum is addressed to all commanding officers under the general’s command. It consists of one paragraph, as follows:

“It has just come to my attention that some agencies within this command do not understand the use of the words suggest, desire, or request , when used by a higher commander. To avoid misunderstanding in the future, I direct that these words be considered the equivalent of a command, and that the only difference to be considered by a recipient of a suggestion , a request, or a desire, is a degree of emphasis which permits commands voiced in this manner to be discussed more freely than when the term direct or command is used. In other words, if a higher headquarters suggests certain improvements which are not immediately applicable to the recipient, it is proper to point out conditions which may not be fully understood by the higher headquarters and to request reconsideration. However, in the absence of such a request for reconsideration, suggestions will be considered as commands.”

The memorandum appears to be a copy of an original. Knight does not say how it came into his hands, but I assume it is genuine. One can only imagine the dialogues that memorandum must have occasioned at Maxwell Field.

Suppose I am a clerk in the office of a captain when the memorandum is delivered. The captain says, “Smith, I suggest you post this in company HQ (HQ means headquarters).”

I read the memo. “Begging your pardon, sir, are you directing me to post the memorandum?”

“Isn’t that what I said?”

“Sir, you said, ‘I suggest.’ ”

“What the hell are you talking about, Smith?”

“Sir, I was only referring to the language of the memorandum itself. It says that if a commanding officer says suggest instead of direct or order , the junior officer, or enlisted man, may engage the commander in a free discussion of the term.”

“Let me see that memo, Smith.”

I hand the memo to the captain. He reads it. “‘Who the hell issued this bucket of trash?” he inquires.

“The commanding general, sir,” I say. “I think it’s rather ambiguous.”

“Watch it, Smith. The commanding general is never ambiguous, though now and then he doesn’t seem to know his head from a bowling ball.”

“Sir. I just wondered what was your degree of emphasis when you said, ‘I suggest.’ ”

“Smith, post this bucket of trash in company HQ, like I told you, and don’t give me any of your lip.”

“Sir, is that a suggestion, a desire or a request?”

“It’s a bloody order, Smith. Move!”

I post the memorandum on the company headquarters wall, in keeping with the captain’s desire, but I wonder how we are ever going to win the war.